An eye on ABC NEWS: Keeping the bastards who keep the bastards honest - honest.

Saturday, May 8, 2010

Fake photo used in Science article

COMMENT: ABC recently reported on a letter signed by 250 scientists published in the journal Science.The letter is accompanied by a photo of a lone Polar Bear on an ice berg credited to ISTOCKPHOTO.COM. The photo is a fake with the following note in the photo caption at Istockphoto: "This images is a photoshop design. Polarbear, ice floe, ocean and sky are real, they were just not together in the way they are now."

The same background is also available with one emperor penguin (HERE) or three (HERE).

What does the use of a faked photo say about the scientific credibility of the journal in question?

Wonder why the ABC didn't pick this one up, they do have previous experience with Polar Bears.

Update 10 May 2010. Roger Pielke Jnr discusses the value of getting the facts right - HERE."The general lesson here should be that no matter the virtues of the "cause" it does not justify cutting corners or fudging the facts. When errors are found, the proper response is not to shoot the messenger or ask people to ignore mistakes in the context of larger truths, but rather, to just get things right."

Update 10 May 2010 Science post a correction.

Correction

The image associated with this article was selected by the editors. We did not realize that it was not an original photograph but a collage, and it was a mistake to have used it.

9 comments:

What are the credentials of these scientists? how many of them are actually working in the field of climate science? Who's payroll are they on, and how much funding are they losing whilst we argue the premise of AGW?

Also there is the question of the 'recent attacks on climate scientists'..... errr excuse me but by their very mis-behaviour in fixing and adulterating climate data and hockey stick graphs, they have left themselves open to attacks - read criticisms! Cherry picking of data is not the scientific method!

It doesn't matter that they are scientists, or even what discipline they work in. This is just the same old argument from authority. If the evidence for AGW was repeatable and verifiable tinker (bleep) bell could make the case.

The article of the type presented here in Science qualifies more as a 'letter to the editor' type similar to what you find in typical newspapers (think the OpEd section) as a opposed to an actual research article. Images selected for these articles sometimes resemble the political cartoons that accompany OpEd pieces to illustrate a point. In this case, the scientists are worried that climate change could adversely affect wildlife and their habitat. That being said, I haven't read the article yet so if the image was presented as real then there was some sloppy editing involved.

Aim of ABC NEWS WATCH

In a diversifying media landscape news editors face an increasingly difficult challenge reviewing the work of reporters under their supervision. Inevitably some mistakes, errors and substandard articles slip past their critical eyes.

The simple aim of ABC NEWS WATCH is to publicise the errors, omissions, and substandard reports produced by the News service and related entities of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). In doing so we hope to provide an independent check or audit on ABC news articles and in doing so improve the standard of ABC news reporting. After all it's our ABC.

We acknowledge and pay respect to the actions, sacrifice, wisdom, traditions, mistakes and curiosity of our ancestors. Their collective efforts over centuries helped evolve our western civilisation, giving birth to the liberal society that makes this website possible.